


Electrolyze

by Winterling42



Series: The Woods [8]
Category: Magic: The Gathering
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Boys Kissing, Enthusiastic Consent, M/M, Oral Sex, Trans Jace
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-15
Updated: 2017-10-08
Packaged: 2018-12-30 01:38:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12097887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Winterling42/pseuds/Winterling42
Summary: Jace and Ral take their relationship a significant step forward. Just some PWP





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> this...may or may not be the reason most of this series exists...
> 
> A Note to My Sister, who I know has read my fic before:
> 
> Please  
> Do not read  
> This story  
> Until you are  
> 18

Ral thought, not for the first time, that it was fucking _hard_ to kiss Jace Beleren properly. Sure, they were on the couch in the grad student lounge, so some vigilance was probably a good thing, but Jace kept breaking away to press kisses along Ral’s neck, his cheeks, his jawline, instead of holding still where Ral could properly taste him.

A damn distraction was what it was.

He ended up on Jace’s lap, trying to pin down the Guildpact with his own weight. And if that happened to give him better access to slide his hands up under Jace’s shirt, well then, that was just an added benefit. Jace’s high-end fashion taste might normally be an abomination, but once mussed up a bit and half-unbuttoned… it was really, really hot. Ral pressed himself closer, wanting to _feel_ Jace’s breath catch, his heart pound.

Until Jace went still under him. Ral leaned back, his heart beating so hard he could feel his pulse everywhere. He forced himself to hold still, to figure out what had happened, but his hands kept running up and down Jace’s ribs of their own accord. It wasn’t until he _looked_ that he saw the bra Jace was wearing, under that vest and a thin undershirt. No, not a bra. A binder.

Jace had his eyes closed, his face turned a little away, like he was waiting for rejection. Ral shifted his weight on Jace’s lap to nip at the hinge of his jaw. “There a problem, Beleren?” he asked it lightly, like the answer didn’t matter. But it _did_ matter when Jace kind of shivered and went boneless under him.

“Not if you don’t have one, Zarek,” he said, and tilted his head to press a soft kiss to Ral’s collarbone.

“Oh good,” Ral sucked in a breath and let his hips grind down. “Cause I was going to ask—if you wanted to come back to my place tonight.”

He startled a tiny, bubbling laugh out of Jace. That, and a smile in his next kiss. “You don’t—I kind of didn’t tell you—“

“You think I can’t get creative?” Ral asked, mock-offended. He leaned back an inch or so. “I’ll have you know I am a highly respected guildmage—“ the rest of his comeback was lost in a laugh as Jace ran one hand along a ticklish band of muscles on his stomach. “ _Jace_ ,” he said, that got him a kiss on the lips. Ral took full advantage, holding Jace’s face still with both hands.


	2. Chapter 2

Ral didn’t bother doing up the buttons of his jacket or roll down his sleeves to go out into the cold. It was the time of night when even his fellow graduates were locked safely in their labs or in their rooms, and they didn’t meet a soul. That made it easier to swing a casual arm around Jace’s shoulders, to hold him a little closer than he should have. To take in the coffee-stain-and-solder smell of Jace, and underneath that, the deep clear smell of water, like a lake or a river.

It also helped that Jace slipped a hand around his waist and kept letting it slide down to touch his butt.

It was only a ten minute walk to the apartments, but it didn’t feel like any distance at all, Jace laughing at his jokes and both of them half-drunk on kisses already.

“Blow anything up recently?” Ral asked, remembering the frog gut incident.

“Should I be asking you that, oh Izzet Guildmage?” Jace drawled.

“Hey, I am a responsible scientist and user of physics.”

“So that weather balloon that dropped a liquid nitrogen bomb on the Rakdos club?”

“You’ve been in Mizzet’s class,” Ral pressed his lips to the edge of Jace’s dark hair, unable to keep his angry satisfaction to himself. “You should know better than anyone that you can’t _control_ weather balloons, Jace. They just go wherever they need to.”

“Mmmmm. And the power surges?”

“Not up to health code. They should really take a look at that exposed wiring. Could be dangerous.” When you didn’t have a rubber floor to walk on.

Jace flashed a quick, angry smile in Ral’s direction. “I’m glad you’ve got people looking out for you, Ral.”

“What, besides the Living Guildpact?” Ral hadn’t meant it as a jab, but Jace’s smile twisted into something bitter.

“Daring rescues not withstanding, I don’t have a good track record of looking out for people. I’m…not exactly reliable.”

“Hey.” Ral pulled them to a stop, swung Jace around so they were standing face to face. “You’re plenty reliable from where I’m standing. I know you took down that Golgari kidnapping ring, even if we did almost get slimed that one time. And, ‘daring rescues not withstanding,’ you’ve saved a lot of people Jace, no matter you want to wriggle out of it. So reliable, definitely. _Effective,_ now, maybe not so much—“

Jace groaned and shoved at him half-heartedly. “Fuck you, Zarek.”

“Thought that was gonna be your job?” Ral held on to Jace’s shoulders, but he waited for Jace to be the one to come back into his space. To… reach up and tug irritably on Ral’s ear. “Ow!”

“Keep on walking before you totally ruin the mood.”

“Aye-aye sir,” Ral muttered with his hands down Jace’s shirt again. “May I take your coat, sir. Can I offer you a light refreshment—“ Jace laughed, and it was like hearing thunder directly overhead.


	3. Chapter 3

Just inside the door, before Jace could take too close a look at the half-empty coffee cups and that one bowl on the table that was growing a Golgari test colony, Ral backed him against the wall and finished unbuttoning his fancy dress shirt. He ran one thumb under the edge of the binder, raising an eyebrow until Jace puffed out a breath and wiggled out of it.

“This isn’t…we don’t have to…” Jace was back to staring at something over Ral’s shoulder, his teeth clenched together and his hands rolled into fists.

And yeah, Ral’s hindbrain tried to send up warning flags, but Ral was very good at not listening to his own warning flags. This was _Jace_ , who couldn’t stop himself from correcting Ral’s math and tugged on his bangs when he was about to get dissolved by acid and who’d stood in front of Exava with nothing but the blue in his eyes. Ral kissed him, trying to remind him of it. One hand he put on Jace’s cheek, slid his thumb down to feel his pulse. The other he cupped over Jace’s breast, feeling _warm_ and _skin_ and ignoring the rest.

“Jace. Everybody’s got nipples. I’m _good,_ if you are.”

Ral waited a moment for an answer, both thumbs rubbing small circles where they’d landed. He could feel Jace’s ribs expand and contract, could feel the faint trembling that meant Jace was still wound way too tight. Finally, _finally_ , Jace put his hands in Ral’s hair and dragged him back down into the kiss. It was fierce, and hungry, and oh Ral loved the taste of Jace’s tongue in his mouth.

“Show me what you’ve got, Zarek.”

Ral grinned, nipped at Jace’s lower lip, and pushed himself back at Jace’s gasp. He watched Jace as he left both jacket and shirt in the living room, walking back to kick off his shoes and pulling them both towards the bedroom. He liked Jace best with his hair mussed, bending down to kick off his own shiny dress shoes and staring back at Ral with wide eyes and red lips. By the time Ral got to the bed he fell back naked, rolling onto his side to pose a little. Jace stopped in the doorway, shirtless and flushed, and Ral let himself stare for a moment. It had been a long while since he’d just let himself _look_ at someone, not like this. Hindbrain was still waving flags, but hell, Jace stripped down to his boxers and climbed into bed with him and Ral was three-quarters of the way to hard just from all their kissing.

“You think of a plan yet, Mr. Scientist?” Jace asked, wrapping a hand around Ral’s cock in an exploratory sort of way. Ral sucked in a quick breath through his teeth, let his eyes unfocus and drop half-shut to _feel that_ , clever fingers sliding down to rub against his balls, up to circle the head, easy and slow and not nearly enough.

“Actually, I did have some ideas,” he said, just a little out of breath. “How do you feel about oral? I used to have a reputation, before I went to college and got obsessed with math instead.”

“You know I don’t—no surgeries, right?” Jace managed to grit out the whole question without stopping his gentle stroking, and Ral grinned as he leaned into it.

“I’ve never done this with a guy before, Jace, but I also didn’t let myself be gay until sophomore year, so I’ve had a little bit of practice.” He ran one hand back along Jace’s side, his back, and he was so lost in listening for Jace’s answer amid all the tingling his body was doing that he almost didn’t notice the razor-straight lines of raised skin that ran down Jace’s skin.

But Jace noticed. It was strange, though, because he’d been wound tighter than a watch all night, but these scars only made him shiver and curl into himself. Not out of nervousness. Out of fear. “Don’t ask about that,” he said to Ral’s ribs. He laid his forehead against Ral’s chest, going very still. Still, but not tense. Afraid and not even willing to run away from his fear. “They’re not…I really want to have sex tonight, alright Ral, but you can’t ask where those scars came from.”

There was nothing like a puzzle to snag Ral’s interest, but Jace was serious about this. He would get up and leave, and maybe Ral could have borne it if it was from anger, or if Jace wasn’t ready. But not out of this boneless fear. Not from this thing that had Jace dreading his own memories more than Ral’s reaction to them.

“Alright.” Ral wrapped his arms around Jace’s skinny chest, so that for a moment they were lying side by side, pressed together ankle to head. “Ok. Sex?”

“Sounds— _good_ ,” Jace gasped as Ral slid one finger down into the length of him, pressing light and biting kisses along his chest and nipples. “Just tongue, yeah?”

“Yeah Beleren.” Ral wanted to be patient, to pay Jace back for all those kisses in the lounge that weren’t long enough or deep enough or hard enough. He wanted to hear every gasp and moan that Jace could make.

Then again, he also wanted to distract the new part of his brain clamoring to know about what kind of weapon left scars as straight as railroad tracks across a man’s spine. About what happened to make Jace hold still for it.

Going down on Jace wasn’t all that different from a rim job, sort of. Easier to think of it that way than to remember all the girls he’d spun around in high school, trying to prove he wasn’t broken. There was soft skin, trembling hips, a hole to lick and circle and press at with just an edge of teeth. Jace rocked his hips in uncertain, jerky motions that Ral smoothed into a pattern with his thumbs heavy on Jace’s skin. It gave him a chance to revel in the slick, sharp-sweet taste, unfamiliar and exciting and as good as Jace’s hand tight in his hair.

When Jace came, it was with a stifled shout and Ral’s name. It took him a second or two to recover, afterwards, and Ral laid his head on Jace’s thigh to breathe, rubbing him through the aftershocks. “Not that you need any encouragement,” Jace said, after he regained the power of speech. “But _fuck_ that was good.”

Ral squirmed his way back up to Jace’s level, smug and thrilled and still hard as a rock. All it took to send him over the edge was looking at Jace lying back, wrung out and smiling, and the electrifying thought that it was _Ral_ who had put him there.

Jace lifted his hand away from his eyes, something like worry creeping in behind those baby blues. “I would’ve,” he said, reach out to touch Ral’s hip with one hand. “Ral, you should’ve—“

“Save it for next time.” Ral leaned in to steal a kiss before he rolled onto his feet, headed for the bathroom.

He pretended not to hear the way Jace muttered, “Next time.” The way it sounded like a promise.


End file.
